He identified the Peoples Democratic Party as the most potent opposition platform capable of defeating the incumbent in the upcoming presidential election fixed for next February, and swiftly added that he is the suitable candidate to fly the party’s flag to victory.
“I’m a free man now and available to try my luck elsewhere but I know that PDP is the biggest party and as long as they follow democratic principle, Buhari will easily be defeated, but if they handpick and force any candidate on the party, they will fail,” Mr Kwankwaso told Dele Momodu in an exchange published Saturday.
Mr Kwankwaso, a serving senator and former governor of Kano State, often claims credits for helping Mr Buhari secure 1.9 million votes in the state. He also helped Governor Umar Ganduja, his deputy while he was governor, to power in the 2015 elections.
Mr Kwankwaso’s attack against the APC comes a few days after he shunned the party’s national convention in Abuja. The crisis was a fallout of his long-running political battle with Mr Ganduje, which had repeatedly turned deadly when their respective supporters clashed.
He turned up at the Abuja home of Atiku Abubakar the night of the convention, fueling speculation about his readiness to dump the ruling party for the major opposition tent. During the week, he travelled to Ekiti to meet Governor Ayo Fayose, arguably the most vocal PDP governor. He was reported to have backed Olusola Eleka, the PDP candidate in the upcoming governorship election in Ekiti, against Kayode Fayemi, his major challenger and candidate of the APC.
Mr Kwankwaso served as defence minister and elected Kano governor on the platform of the PDP, but joined then-newly-formed APC in 2013 as part of the renegade ‘newPDP’ bloc. But in recent months, he has been among top ‘newPDP’ bigwigs finding it difficult to remain in the APC, amidst rankles about marginalisation.
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